


An Exchange

by Oroburos69



Series: Gift-Giver [1]
Category: The Mentalist
Genre: Angst and Humor, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-30
Updated: 2009-11-30
Packaged: 2017-10-26 15:49:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,963
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/285064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Oroburos69/pseuds/Oroburos69
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jane keeps giving the team gifts.  They are surprised, confused, and eventually amused when they figure out why.</p>
            </blockquote>





	An Exchange

**Lisbon**

A traffic jam made her half an hour late to work. When Lisbon finally made it past the tangled mess of traffic, Jane was in her office. She leaned against the doorway for a moment, taking the opportunity to catch him unaware.

He knelt by the side of her desk, peering at the carpet intently. Lisbon tilted her head. The new perspective didn’t make sense either. She cleared her throat, feeling a guilty thrill of amusement when he jumped. “Jane, what are you doing?” Lisbon asked, trying not to laugh. He didn’t need the encouragement.

Jane’s head rose over the edge of her desk and his eyes smiled at her. “Finding my contact!” he said cheerfully. His eyes flickered back to the carpet and he shifted a bit. “Oh, look, there it is!” Jane rose to his feet and walked out of Lisbon’s office, pausing to give her a critical look. “Did you get a haircut?” he asked, smiling broadly, eyes twinkling.

Lisbon looked over at her desk. Her day planner was open. “Yes, Jane,” she sighed, rolling her eyes.

“It looks nice,” he called over his shoulder as she shooed him out.

It was an hour or two later when Lisbon remembered that Jane had twenty-twenty vision. She went over the carpet with a fine toothed comb looking for…she didn’t know what, but she was sure there was something. She found nothing, but did resolve to speak to the custodian about vacuuming significantly more often.

When she stood up, hands pressed into her aching back, there was a slice of cherry pie and a cup of piping hot coffee on her desk. She frowned at it and went to the window in her office. Jane was chatting with Van Pelt, using knick knacks from around the office to explain something. He looked up, as if he could feel her eyes on him. He seemed nervous, but that was ridiculous. Jane didn’t know the meaning of the word.

Lisbon shrugged and went to her desk. There was paperwork to do. Jane passed in front of her window three times in five minutes. The third time, she picked up the fork and raised her eyebrow at him. He went and sat down on his couch.

She ate the pie and drank the coffee. Cherry was her favorite.

 **Cho**

Cho forgot a file and had to return for it in the middle of the night. Only about half the lights were on and he almost didn’t see Jane when he passed the unit room.

Cho paused, blinking in confusion. Jane was asleep on the couch, sprawled out on his side, legs and arms dangling off the edge. Cho was fairly certain that Jane was drooling on the leather, and he decided to talk to the janitor about getting the couch cleaned.

The book in Jane’s hand was about to fall, so Cho snuck in and pulled it away before it could. He looked at it in interest, attention caught by the tanned Amazon on the cover dressed only in the Jolly Roger. Well, half the Jolly Roger. _Love on the High Seas_ seemed to have had a budget crunch when it came to costumes.

He flipped through it, amused by the lurid descriptions of swashbuckling pirates and saucy wenches. Ten minutes later, the sound of the building settling pulled his attention away from the characters’ daring exploits and wild sex lives. His eyebrows rose and he gave Jane a curious glance before putting a bookmark in Jane’s spot and placing the book on the floor beside the couch.

It was nearly a week later when he found a copy of _The Princess Bride_ on his desk. Cho picked it up and flipped through it idly, looking for its owner. He had to fight down a laugh when he realized that it was the book sleeve of _The Princess Bride_ over a hardcover copy of _Love on the High Seas_.

Cho looked up and saw Jane watching him from the couch. Cho sat down and began the story from the beginning, ignoring the paperwork for a while. _She was a merry lass with eyes of blued steel, rose red hair and thighs that could crack nuts…  
_  
Out of the corner of his eye he saw Jane settling into the couch for a nap.

 **Van Pelt**

Grace came in to work early one day. There was a bouquet of bright orange roses on her desk and she wondered what the hell Wayne was thinking. ‘Not at work’ was their damn motto.

She made a show of sniffing the flowers and looking for a card (there wasn’t one and she was either mightily grateful or terrified that Jane had grabbed it first). At the first opportunity, she cornered Wayne by his desk, and pretended to ask him a question about some random folder on her desk.

She leaned over his desk, palm pressed into the wood (which was awfully dusty, Grace noticed, making a mental note to speak with the cleaning lady). “What the hell were you thinking?” Grace muttered, glaring at him and pointing at the folder to divert suspicion. Perhaps too much diversion, she realized when Wayne looked at the folder blankly and then back at her.

“Isn’t that the expense report for the Gladoski case?” he asked, sounding completely baffled. “I wasn’t even on that case.”

Grace rolled her eyes and waved the folder. His eyes followed it and she continued, perhaps longer than she really should have, just to see how long he would watch it. “No, the flowers,” she whispered, letting her eyes drift towards her desk. Wayne had a really good view of her desk, she realized.

Cho wandered by, asking, “Has anyone seen my tie?” Grace shook her head and opened the folder as if to show Wayne something. Cho walked on, looking around the office as if his tie could be hiding in the corners.

Wayne shook his head vehemently. “I didn’t get you those,” he hissed back, the gravity of the situation suddenly apparent to him. “Jane brought them in.”

Grace stiffened and then relaxed. Act normal, she coached herself, turning to look at Jane. He was reading a book, but must have felt their eyes watching him with those crazy mind powers that Grace was still half convinced he had. He smiled and waved cheerfully.  
 **  
Rigsby**

Rigsby was alone in the office. He had paperwork to finish and everyone else had gone out for lunch. It was as dismal a day as California got, all overcast gray clouds flat enough to be the sky itself. He tried to ignore the nasty weather and concentrate on the paperwork involved with justifying, denying, or explaining Jane’s actions, but he really wanted to go have lunch instead.

Rigsby was in the middle of daydreaming about hoagies when Jane walked up behind him and dropped one on his desk. He jerked and spun to face Jane, who beamed at him and added a bottle of cream soda next to the hoagie.

“You looked hungry,” Jane said, patting Rigsby on the shoulder as he wandered off toward the couch.

Rigsby opened the paper wrapping and grinned in delight. Meatballs, he loved meatballs! Suddenly he was starving. Rigsby mumbled a thank you through the first delicious bite. He thought he heard Jane tell him that he was welcome, but it was muffled by how good the sandwich was.

Rigsby soon returned to work, hunger sated by what he was certain was the greatest sandwich he had ever had. Jane left early, saying he needed to water his houseplants and find a man named Gary (sometimes Rigsby didn’t know if Jane was joking or not).

Around three they got a call from La Grange, a tiny town deep inland. Rigsby stood to walk out with the rest of the team.

He stumbled almost immediately and had to look down in confusion. His shoe was missing. It took him a moment to comprehend this and then he looked under his desk. His shoe was not under his desk (though it was awfully dirty—he would have to talk to maintenance about that). Rigsby glanced around, completely at a loss. “Hey, Cho,” he called. “Have you seen my shoe?”

“No,” Cho responded, putting a book mark into his newest book, _Moby Dick,_ and putting it in his desk drawer. “Did you lose them?” he asked.

“No, not both, only the one,” Rigsby explained, peering into the corners of the office, his sock-clad foot resting on the one with the shoe.

“You lost one shoe?” Lisbon asked as she walked out her office. Her eyebrow twitched up in disbelief.

Rigsby shrugged helplessly.

 **Jane  
**  
It all would have remained an office legend, and fodder for jokes about how Rigsby should have been born blond, had a visiting politician not made the mistake of sitting on Jane’s couch. Jane glared at him, his lips curling back into an unfriendly smile.

The politician didn’t notice, as he was preoccupied with shifting restlessly on the couch. “What the hell do you have under here?” he questioned. “Bricks?” He flashed a lack luster attempt at a charming smile at Lisbon.

She watched him expressionlessly.

Undeterred, the man dug under the cushions, completely missing Jane’s look of rage. He made a little sound of triumph and pulled out Rigsby’s shoe. He blinked at it. “How often do you clean in here?” he asked.

Jane backed away, disappearing into the hallway.

“How did…?” Lisbon asked in confusion, turning to look for Jane. “Jane?” she asked, looking for him. Lisbon walked out to the hallway. He was walking briskly toward the stairs.

“Hey, that’s my tie!”

Lisbon shrugged and went to the couch. She blinked and picked up a leather glove poking out from the crack of the couch. “I thought I lost this,” she said, a little confused.

Van Pelt ducked into the fray, passing by the confused politician, who still held Rigsby’s shoe. “That’s my favorite hair clip!” she snatched up a shiny mass of ties and pins.

Rigsby took his shoe and looked at it in confusion. “How did it get into the couch?” he asked, picking at the laces.

They all looked at each other, even the politician, who looked more and more bewildered.

“Jane?” Van Pelt suggested.

“Jane,” Cho confirmed, shoving his tie into his pocket.

“Jane?” Rigsby asked.

“Jane!” Lisbon swore. She sighed and shoved the glove into her pocket.

“Who’s Jane?” the politician asked, watching their interactions like a tennis match.

The team looked at him for a moment and then shrugged in unison, wandering off to their desks. There was paper work to do.

 **In Conclusion**

Lisbon lost her earring the same day Jane brought her a white scarf. She liked the scarf, so she waited a week. Then she pulled the plastic baggie out of the couch and took her earring from it.

Grace ate the tart and left her sock in the couch. She had more at home.

Cho needed his tie. It was a Christmas gift from his grandmother and he was having dinner with his family next week. He took the tie out on Friday and replaced it with another one. On Monday the tie he’d put in the sofa was on his desk, resting between the pages of _Hamlet_ ( _Diary of a Sex Crazed Vixen_ ). The tee-shirt he kept in his gym bag was missing.

Rigsby liked the meatball subs. He took his shoes, ties, suit jackets and, on one memorable occasion, pants, out of the couch on a weekly basis. And started keeping a full change of clothes in the office.

Jane slept on the couch whenever he had the time and played poker with the cleaning team at night.  



End file.
